Jenny Feige (Germany): The Atacama Desert as Mars analog and extraterrestrial dust trap

The Atacama Desert belongs to the driest places on Earth and its soils represent an analog for the extremely dry surface of Mars, where the hyper-arid conditions are one of the main obstacles for life to exist. Furthermore, the stable climate conditions in the Atacama Desert over millions of years have allowed for a continuous accumulation of atmospheric dust resulting in sedimentary records that represent an ideal trap for interplanetary and interstellar material.
We have collected samples from a 4.20 m deep Atacama playa soil profile that we suspect to reach back millions of years in time. Dating of the samples is based on ¹⁰Be measurements conducted at VERA, Vienna. Once their age is determined, we will investigate the correlation of microbial community vs. climatic shifts, search for micrometeorites and for the first continental ⁶⁰Fe-signature of nearby supernovae,
which left their traces at 2-3 Myr and 6-8 Myr ago.